Ryanair plans digital overhaul with new website and mobile apps

Ryanair is investing "heavily" in IT and plans to roll out a new website and mobile boarding passes by the end of April.

Ryanair is investing "heavily" in IT and plans to roll out a new website and mobile boarding passes by the end of April.

The budget airline is boosting technology spending despite reporting a third-quarter loss of 35 million (£28.9 million) today, which it said was in line with guidance.

"We are investing heavily in IT and web development, and expect to deliver a new improved website by the end of April, which will be more intuitive for our customers, allowing them to readily identify our lowest fares, our routes, our timetables, as well as enabling them to share our low fares with friends and family," Ryanair said in its results statement.

"We are also on target to roll out mobile boarding passes in April, a new business travel product by the end of May and an industry-leading mobile app, tailored for smartphones and tablets, by the end of June 2014."

In addition, Ryanair is looking to expand its distribution base by selling tickets via global distribution systems (GDS). It is partnering with Google's European 'Flight Search' function, which will allow people searching the terms 'cheap fares' or 'low cost flights' on the Flight Search price comparison engine to find Ryanair tickets.

"We are in active negotiations with a number of GDS suppliers, and hope, subject to the successful conclusion of these discussions and IT integration issues, that Ryanair's low fares and comprehensive route network will appear in one or more GDS channels by mid-year," the airline said.

Ryanair began working on its new digital strategy in November 2013, when it upgraded its website to make it easier to use, by reducing the booking process from 17 to just five 'clicks'. It achieved this by making changes such as removing the 'recaptcha' security code from the website for individual bookings.

It followed this up with a 'My Ryanair' customer registration service in December, which allows passengers to store their personal and payment details online.